Monday, December 1, 2008

Dog + Mouse Poison = Emergency Vet Visit

Saturday night we had plans with Katherine and Marc to watch the BYU/UTAH game at their apartment. I decided we would bring the kids (dogs) with us since we didn’t get to spend a lot of time with them that day. We packed up their stuff, picked up the pizzas, and headed over to watch the game. We were there for all of 1 minute when Briggs decided to do what he does best and eat stuff off the floor (he’s like a scavenger when we go places, like we don’t feed him or something). This time his dog scavenging habit got him into deep trouble. Because the mortuary is so old, the apartments have been known to get a mouse from time to time. To prevent this, Marc and Katherine put mouse poison pellets on the floor in their kitchen. Briggs thought it was a tasty snack they had left out for him. Luckily Gordon caught him before he ate the whole pile. He looked at Marc, knowing exactly what it was, then told me to take him to the vet. It was five o’clock in the evening on a Saturday night, my vet was not open this late! I called anyway to make sure and sure enough not open. We looked in the phone book for an animal ER and called them to see what they would suggest. They said to bring him right in. The animal ER was about 20 minutes away (which is a ridiculous amount time in an emergency situation). I was frantic! When Gordon first told me he ate mouse poison I was shocked…then my emotions kicked in and I started to cry but not a lot. When I hit the car I lost it! I couldn’t talk or breathe. I had no idea how mouse poison worked. Gordon made the mistake of starting to tell me what it does and I went into panic mode! I’m grateful Gordon can stay calm and collected in these types of situations because I found out I cannot. When we arrived they took Briggs back immediately. They explained they would give him something to make him vomit. Forty-five minutes later the vet came out to talk to us. He had a bucket with him that had Briggs’ vomit inside to show us that indeed Briggs ingested mouse poison. Because we didn’t know what kind of mouse poison it was the vet had to explain both types and the effects from them to us. One was treatable. The other was not (it effects the brain and nervous system). I called Katherine to ask if she knew what kind it was. They didn’t. The vet said he would just treat Briggs like he ingested the treatable kind. The next step was to feed Briggs activated charcoal. This helps to soak up any toxins that might be released or poison left in his stomach. The vet also gave us a prescription for Vitamin K to help his blood clot (because the treatable mouse poison is the kind that causes the mouse to bleed internally). We were told to give this to him twice a day for one month then take him to his vet for a protime (a test that shows if Briggs’ blood is clotting normally).
Two hours later Briggs was returned to us with a black mouth (from the charcoal) and a look of relief on his face. I’m pretty sure he thought we left him there to die. Abbi was also with us during this whole fiasco. She does not do well when Briggs is gone. She was anxious the entire time. She wouldn’t sit still and either wanted to be held or walk around. When Briggs came back she had to be right by him sniffing him and making sure he was ok.
To this day Briggs does not know he did anything wrong. He’s doing great. He never did really did bad. He was just as hyper when he got home from the ER when he was before we went.. He’s a trooper.
I have learned a lesson through all of this…I will not take my dogs everywhere with me. I will only take them to our parent’s houses. Other than that, they have to stay home. I really didn’t take them everywhere anyways so it’s not going to be that big of a change. They don’t know any different so they won’t know anything has changed. I’m grateful for my cute little dogs. I can’t imagine my life without them. I love them so much. Gordon loves them too (he just doesn’t feel as strongly about them as I do). We have such a great life with each other and all our dogs!

Briggs and Abbi after the incident-Both doing well
(sweaters courtesy of 'Big Matt')

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